Advice on mini-itx motherboard/CPU

Whiffle

Whiffle

Whiffle

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27 Jul 2009
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Hi there,

I am looking to a build a new mini-itx pc to act as a mediaportal client.

I want to go down the Sandybridge route and have decided that a decent CPU choice would be the i3-2100T. I was a bit worried about going for a CPU with HD2000 graphics over HD3000, but have heard that it makes no difference if you are not playing games (I shall only be using it form decoding streamed media from my server).

I would be really grateful for advice on what to buy.

Thanks
 
If it's literally only for streaming from your server, why bother with SB at all?

You'll be paying a small fortune for the motherboard, and then whacking in a low end CPU?

I'd go down the AMD route, possibly even fusion.
 
I currently have an Acer Revo Aspire R3610 as a Mediaportal Client in my bedroom and although it is fine, it can be slow at times due to the Atom - especially brining up the EPG etc.

This is fine in the bedroom but would drive me mad in my livingroom - apparently the Fusion would not be that much better in the respect.

I figured that the i3-2100T was a very low power alternative but powerful enough to run Mediaportal flawlessly.
 
Depends on the media really.

If it's all 24p HD content stay away from Intel onboard gfx,the HD 2000 and 3000 still cant sync 24p HD properly and wont until its fixed in hardware next new architecture.
If you still want an i3 for 24p and more general system "snappiness" over Atom and Zacate,pair it with a gtx430 or an hd6450.

E-350 (Zacate) is not much faster than Atom you are correct about this and if you run a system without an ssd they are really sluggish,but that's par for the course at this level of hardware.
Decoding wise they are extremely good though.

Llano is due soon,this will change the HTPC landscape entirely.
As for price we'll find out soon enough,but dont hold your breath for cheap.
While not designed and targeted specifically for HTPC users they do tick "every" box feature wise.
A "decent" casual gaming experience at low wattage will also become a reality with Llano.
 
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Skyboat said:
Source?
Click to expand...

My bad it's 24p content the HD2000/3000 won't sync properly,edited the post with corrections.

From Anandtech's 2500k/2600k review.

How about 23.976 fps playback? Sorry guys, even raking in $11 billion a quarter doesn’t make you perfect.

Here’s the sitch, most movie content is stored at 23.976 fps but incorrectly referred to as 24p or 24 fps. That sub-30 fps frame rate is what makes movies look like, well, movies and not soap operas (this is also why interpolated 120Hz modes on TVs make movies look cheesey since they smooth out the 24 fps film effect). A smaller portion of content is actually mastered at 24.000 fps and is also referred to as 24p.

In order to smoothly playback either of these formats you need a player and a display device capable of supporting the frame rate. Many high-end TVs and projectors support this just fine, however on the playback side Intel only supports the less popular of the two: 24.000Hz.

This isn’t intentional, but rather a propagation of an oversight that started back with Clarkdale. Despite having great power consumption and feature characteristics, Clarkdale had one glaring issue that home theater enthusiasts discovered: despite having a 23Hz setting in the driver, Intel’s GPU would never output anything other than 24Hz to a display.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/...-core-i7-2600k-i5-2500k-core-i3-2100-tested/7
 
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Bit of a let down that. I suppose the only way that I am going to get Sandybridge working properly in a mini-HTPC is to couple it with a discrete graphics card, but this means adding extra heat/energy/physical space to a mini-itx build, which sort of goes against the nature of a mini-itx build in the first place.

Have I got any other options?
 
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